Fitness, food and random ramblings…

Cheat Meals

To have or not to have, the ever debatable question gracing many internet forums. For every one person who says you shouldn’t there will be another one who says you should. I say YES, cheat meals are absolutely necessary for me. I much prefer being incredibly strict with my food knowing I have one meal a week where I can have a bit of a blow out.

All week I dream about white bread filled with cheese, pizzas, pasta, ice cream and chocolate cake. When it comes down to the actual event, I’m a bit of a poor show. Take this Friday’s cheat meal:

It was a peanut butter and chutney burger, with bacon, sweet potato fries, a strawberry milkshake and a strawberry cider. I drooled over the thought of having it, had crazy plans to have at least 3 ciders that evening. The reality of it is, eating 6 small meals per day means a meal like this fills me up before I’m even half way through, meaning I left half of my burger…poor show, I know! Don’t get me wrong it was absolutely delicious, everything I had dreamed of all week. I felt completely satisfied as I lay on my sofa that evening, stroking my food baby!

Cheat meals, for me, are always on a Friday or Saturday night. Always at night as if I had a cheat meal in the morning for brunch perhaps, I’d be tempted to say ‘ah well I’ve broken my meal plan now, might as well eat like this the whole of the rest of the day’. Having them on a Friday or Saturday also means I still have two full weekend days to burn off some of the damage, if I’ve managed a particularly crazy amount of food.

Then the meal plan is back to normal as soon as I wake up and start dreaming of next weeks cheat meal. I’m thinking mac n cheese and some chocolate for this week…

What are your opinions on cheat meals? Does it help you stay focussed?

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2 thoughts on “Cheat Meals”

I have done cheat meals for years and I believe they are absolutely essential. Depriving yourself of everything you truly love all the time will eventually result in long term, or too regular, bad eating habits.

And, like you said, eventually your body will adjust to healthy eating to the point where it’s harder to overdue it when it comes to cheat meals.

Also, meals you really shouldn’t eat are much more enjoyable when they are a once a week treat than they are every day.